MacArthur Foundation, We Love You
by Tony Chavira
Straight from the horse's mouth...
Seizing the opportunity to make needed long-term investments in the face of a weak economy, 12 states and cities are launching innovative projects to preserve more than 70,000 affordable rental homes.
Sure, there are plenty of options to invest in affordable housing in the USA. But they were cool enough to commit $700,000 to preserving affordable housing in Los Angeles.
Nearly two-thirds of Los Angeles’ four million residents are renters. In 2006, nearly 20 percent of all rental households lived in overcrowded conditions, while almost half of them spent more than 30 percent of income on rent. Furthermore, nearly one-third of the subsidized housing stock (22,000 of 65,000 units) is at risk of losing its affordability when covenants or subsidy contracts expire in the next ten years.
[...]
The Los Angeles Housing Department will use grant funds to enhance its Affordable Housing Preservation Program (Preservation Program) to better coordinate its efforts with other city departments and target its resources to preserving affordable rental housing by hiring additional staff and channeling resources to undertake three complementary initiatives.
The improved program will conduct a robust data collection effort on affordable and market-rate housing, including the development of criteria to identify at-risk projects, information on affordability restrictions, characteristics, and the physical condition of existing affordable properties. A sustained outreach program to target owners of properties that may lose their affordability, because of expiring covenants or subsidy contract terminations, will be matched by a communications strategy to systematically educate residents of subsidized properties about their rights and options, if their property loses its rental subsidy or other restrictions. Finally, the Preservation Program will facilitate the acquisition of properties identified as suitable preservation opportunities based on the enhanced database and extended outreach efforts.
Looks good to me! Let's see where the money goes! If you're interested, contact Yolanda Chavez at the Housing Department. Her contact info's at the bottom of the press release... here's the link again, just in case. Thanks John & Catherine MacArthur Foundation!
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